


Burdened with Glorious Desserts

by aurilly



Category: Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Golden Age (Narnia), M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-17
Updated: 2019-08-17
Packaged: 2020-09-06 05:27:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20286154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aurilly/pseuds/aurilly
Summary: Loki takes a wrong turn in time and space and ends up in Narnia instead of the SHIELD location at the start of Avengers 1.





	Burdened with Glorious Desserts

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sombregods](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sombregods/gifts).

Edmund and Lucy were enjoying a post-lunch coffee on their favorite of the many garden patios of Cair Paravel, discussing plans for the upcoming harvest festival as well as the shocking prices on iron being charged by Galman traders, when the ground shook mightily.

Edmund had heard of earthquakes, back during a time and a life he barely remembered. But it seemed that such events were not widely understood in Narnia, for the people and creatures—sentries, servants, friends, ambassadors, gourmands who knew that the third of the month was when the Cair Paravel cook produced his internationally famous meringues—looked at one another in alarm and confusion.

"I didn't think the dwarves would begin their new mine until next week," a hare said, clutching the table.

"The mine is to be at the other end of Narnia," replied a nymph. 

When a hole in the fabric of the world opened up, revealing a dark sky full of stars where formerly there had been a lovely dessert buffet, Edmund began to think that, just perhaps, this was more than an earthquake. 

"Bother. Of all the rotten luck. I hadn't had my meringues yet!" Lucy complained. 

"Ware, friends!" shouted a centaur, in a grave and forbidding voice that silenced all (centaur voices were usually grave and forbidding, and usually silenced everyone in this way, making them unpopular guests at parties). "Cosmic forces gather!"

"We didn’t need him to tell us that. Any idiot can see so," Edmund whispered to Lucy. But he put away his annoyance and performed his duties as king. He ordered everyone to get behind him, and drew his sword as Lucy drew her dagger. Together, with matching set jaws and steely brown eyes, they faced the gaping maw of misplaced night sky. 

Blue tendrils of light emerged from the hole and solidified at its center. Edmund had never seen smoke that was also light that was also blue before, and he found it beautiful. The smoke-light coalesced into a familiar shape: the shape of a crouching man.

"I am Loki, of Asgard, and I am burdened with glorious…" The man looked around him, at the hares and horses and hens, at the outdoor tapestries lining the walls of the castle courtyard. "This doesn't look like Midgard."

"This is Narnia," Edmund said, just as imposingly as the stranger's aborted introduction. "And I am Edmund, King. I know not how you have entered our land, but if you come in peace you are welcome."

The stranger, Loki, he had called himself, tilted his head, a bit like a deranged sparrow on the molt. "And if I do not?"

Lucy brandished her daggers in reply.

"How sweet," Loki said, and a matching dagger appeared, as though by magic, in the hand that was not holding the glowing spear. "Where is the Tesseract? I must retrieve it, lest…" For all his bluster and overall air of unhinged threat, something terrified lurked behind his bright blue eyes, as blue as the smoke tendrils that had brought him here.

Unfortunately, those eyes were marred by horrible brown bags—a temporary disfigurement caused by torture and error. A disfigurement with which Edmund was well-accustomed, having seen it on his own face shortly after being rescued from the Witch. This stranger also sweated profusely, moisture mixing with the ill-advised spiky greasiness of his hair. There was something in the way he moved, as though clawing through existence took more effort than swimming, that reminded Edmund of nasty magic—the kind that ensorcelled you, that kept you largely master of yourself, but exacerbated all your worst qualities. Yet another familiar detail that Edmund knew all too well.

With his height and his leathers and his expressive face and his overall aura of mystery, the man would be exceedingly handsome, Edmund thought. He needed only to be cured of whatever ailed him. Edmund's heart (or perhaps it was his hormones, but who truly possessed the self-awareness to tell?) went out to the mad lunch-interrupter. Or, well, it would have, had the man's knife not been pointed in the direction of Lucy's throat. 

That was easily solved by a mole springing up out of the ground and snatching the dagger from his hands. Loki made an undignified little hop and screech of surprise. "What is this place?" he asked in even sweatier horror and distress. "Where is the Tesseract? Hand it over now, so that I may leave at once." 

"Edmund already told you. Don't you listen?" Lucy said. "This is Narnia."

"I know not this Tesseract of which you speak," Edmund said, more kindly this time, but still ready to deflect any projectiles thrown at his sister. "But if you are in trouble, we can help."

"Beware, sire!" Flerig the centaur boomed again. "This newcomer brings the trouble, not the other way round."

"That doesn't even make any sense," Lucy whispered to Edmund. 

"Not to mention is entirely obvious," Edmund whispered back.

"You know I can hear you slagging off about the centaur, don't you?" Loki asked, resulting in an offended and dismayed neigh somewhere behind Edmund. But for once, Loki managed to out-drown even a centaur, because he continued, with impassioned and nonsensical fervor, "My ears are more powerful than the ears of men, more attuned than the auditory nodes of a Muspelheimian salamander, more… Oh, are those meringues?"

By this time, the unnatural sky that had framed him like an apse around a statue had faded away, revealing, to the palpable relief of everyone gathered, the dessert buffet, unharmed.

"Yes, and they're excellent. Won't you try one?" Edmund asked. "On second thought, we have a special, sacred sauce, one single drop of which will render the meringue even more delicious than it looks. Won't you let Queen Lucy here get it for you to try?" 

Edmund looked at Lucy with the very slightest of squints, which he tried to pass off to the rest of the company as a response to the midday sun's glare. But he and Lucy knew one another too well, and had lived in one another's pockets for too long for her not to follow his meaning. Edmund had no doubts that Lucy understood, but he worried the ruse might prove too obvious to work on Loki, who seemed like a clever, perceptive fellow.

But either whatever was making him ill had thrown Loki off his usual balance or because he really did love meringues, or because (and this was the one for which Edmund sincerely hoped) the appraising once-over Loki had given Edmund had left him in an as ill-advisedly trusting mood as the once-over Edmund had given Loki, Loki nodded. 

Or maybe it was because Lucy, actually the most dangerous of the four siblings, had long-ago mastered the art of appearing entirely harmless. Loki watched her skip, as though a man from the sky had not just appeared out of nowhere and threatened her people, with a curiously surprised look on his face, as though he had at first wished to attack her, but decided someone so simple wasn't worth the effort. While he waited, he helped himself to some lemonade. 

Sensing a lessening of the tension in the air, the Narnians began to spread out again, warily returning to their abandoned plates and conversations. Edmund alone remained en garde. 

"Where are they going?" Loki asked, largely to himself, as he watched everyone hop or trot away. He seemed rather put out, but, being a stranger, had no way of knowing that Narnians' base mode was one of blithe unconcern.

"They are going back to their business, since it is clear that yours will rest largely with me, their king." That seemed to mollify him a bit, so, Edmund continued, with the same nonchalant confidence, "While we wait, would you like to tell us what this is all about?" he asked, waiting politely for the last of the lemonade to go down Loki's long, attractive neck. 

"I have been sent here by the mighty and fearsome Thanos, to retrieve the Tesseract and take command and domination over the humans."

"Well, Lucy and I, and our siblings, are the only humans around, so I'm afraid there aren't very many of us to command, even if any of us were to submit." And if that last phrase came out a little more flirtatiously than was _quite_ regal, well, it wouldn't do any harm.

"The Other must have confused the coordinates," Loki muttered, frowning. "Fool!"

Lucy returned, holding the small vial containing her precious cordial, just as Edmund had hoped she would. "Let me dress your dessert for you," she said, and let one drop fall onto the meringue she plated for him.

"I don't doubt this is a pathetic attempt to poison me, but your mortal juices can have no power over one such as me. You are no magicians. That, I can tell, so whatever 'sauce' this vial contains will hold no power over me. I laugh at your pitiful attempts."

He took a bite, and his eyes opened wide. 

"It's good, isn't it?"

But Loki seemed too overcome to respond, both from the deliciously sticky base that was the cook's signature addition to the recipe, and also from the effect of the cordial, which were immediate. The brewing storm behind his gaze cleared, the bags under his eyes faded away, the sweat all over his face began to evaporate. Even his hair looked a bit less greasily enraged. 

Yes, Edmund thought. Every bit as handsome as he'd suspected. 

Loki shook his head as one waking up from a long and tortured nightmare. He squinted at Lucy. "What was that?"

"Juice from the flowers that grow in the sun," she replied sweetly. "It'll cure whatever ails you."

"What _did_ ail you?" Edmund asked curiously. Rather than bothering the servants, who seemed to be having a nice time dancing in the corner, he dragged a seat over himself to make a nice, convivial little trio.

"Something more horrible than your sheltered minds can comprehend. I thank you for shaking me of it."

Lucy rolled her eyes. "So dramatic."

"I believe it was warranted, however. 

Loki paused at Edmund's speech, radiating interest. He looked Edmund up and down once more. "_'Our'_ siblings, you said? So, you two are …"

"Untethered," Edmund replied. He even dared to wink. 

"Speak for yourself, brother," Lucy said. 

Edmund turned to her, sputtering with all the protectiveness of an older brother. "What… _Who_…? 

"It's really none of your business," she said coolly.

Beside them, Loki bit his lip, but too late, as a small laugh had already escaped. 

"What humours you, friend?" Lucy asked.

"My elder brother behaved similarly at the idea of me seeking out pleasure."

"Simply at the idea?" Edmund asked curiously. "What about at the expression of it?"

Loki shifted uncomfortably in his chair, and his jaw twitched in endearingly obvious embarrassment. 

I see how it is, Edmund thought, and then smiled. He leaned over to Loki, who watched guardedly as Edmund moved his hand closer and closer to his strong leg and then placed that hand upon it, massaging ever so suggestively with his thumb, which traveled just a little too high on Loki's thigh for his intentions to be misunderstood. 

"I, too, have an elder brother, one who would react similarly if I were to, ahem, _finally_ progress from ideas to expressions," he whispered. "What say you? Shall we enrage two with one act?"

Loki gulped. Carnal hunger was a much more attractive look on him than power hunger had been.

Lucy laughed and passed each of them a slice of cake. "If you don't ensure I am in the room when Peter finds out, you will learn about the wrath of a younger sister. And I promise you, dearest brother," she continued with a terrifying sweetness, "that it is ever so much more fearsome." 

"You terrify me," Loki took a moment to note, before slowly turning to Edmund with a whisper of a smile and a face full of assent.

This was turning out to be a wonderful day, and promised to turn into an even more interesting evening.


End file.
